CONTACTS:
To message Archimandrite Kyril or to arrange a baptism or wedding please email the Parish Priest@bristol-orthodox-church.co.uk (Tel. 01179706302 or 07944 860 955).
For more see: CONTACTS
oif St John Chrysostom
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Every Saturday: 5.30 p.m. Vespers Every Sunday: 10.30 a.m. Divine Liturgy
WEEKLY SERVICES & INFORMATION (Note: our Parish follows the “New” (Revised Julian) Calendar. For dates on the “Old” Julian Calendar, refer to an online calendar. The exceptions are: 1. The Feast of The Nativity (Christmas), for which we have services on both calendars; 2. The lectionary for the Sundays before The Nativity and up to The Great Fast, for which we follow the usage typified by the Orthodox Church of America.
NB: Between October and The Great Fast the lectionaries of the different Orthodox local churches do not coincide. This affects the Sunday Epistle (Apostle) and Gospel readings. Our parish follows the more traditional sequence as published online by the Orthodox Church of America (though it is, of course, not “theirs”!). This will not always match the current (and more recent) sequence used by, for instance, the Moscow Patriarchate or of the Great Church of Constantinople.
Friday 20th December. Beginning of the Forefeast of the Nativity. Holy Martyr Ignatius, “the God-bearer”, Bishop of Antioch (107). Fast: wine and oil.
Saturday 21st December. Fast: wine and oil. 5.30 p.m. Vespers
Sunday 22nd December. 26th Sunday After Pentecost. Tone 1. Forefeast of the Nativity. Sunday of the Holy Fathers: All the Righteous who pleased God, from Adam to Joseph the Betrothed. Fast: wine and oil. Readings: Hebrews 11: 9-10, 17-23, 32-40 Matthew 1:1-25 10.30 a.m. Divine Liturgy and short panichida for Mary (Daphne) Lock and for Anna.
CHRISTMASTIDE SERVICES: Note: we are changing our pattern of services over the Christmas period this year. We hope this will enable more people to come!
Christmas Eve, Tuesday 24th December. Strict fast. 5.00 p.m. Vigil Service (Great Compline and Matins of the Feast) This service lasts about two hours and this will allow you to get the bus home before they all stop at 8.00 p.m.!
Wednesday 25th December THE NATIVITY OF OUR LORD AND SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST 9.00 a.m. Divine Liturgy of the Feast NOTE: FAST FREE PERIOD UNTIL 5th JANUARY
Saturday 28th December. Afterfeast of The Nativity. 5.30 p.m. Vespers
Sunday 29th December. 30th Sunday After Pentecost. Sunday after the Nativity. Commemoration of St Joseph the Betrothed, David the King, and James the brother of the Lord. Commemoration of the Holy Innocent Children slain by Herod. Readings: Galatians 1:11-19 Matthew 2:13-23 10.30 a.m. Divine Liturgy
Tuesday 31st December. Eve of the Feast of the Circumcision of Christ and the Feast of St Basil the Great. New Year’s Eve. 6.30 p.m. Vespers of the Feast and the “Te Deum” in thanksgiving for the New Year.
Wednesday, 1st January 2025. Civil New Year. The Feast of the Circumcision of Christ. St Basil the Great, Archbishop of Caesarea in Cappodocia (379A.D.) St Gregory of Nazianzus, father of St Gregory the Theologian (3-4c). St Emilia, mother of St Basil, St Gregory of Nyssa, St Macrina, and St Peter of Sebaste (3-4c). (No service)
Thursday, 2nd January. Forefeast of the Theophany. St Sylvester, Pope of Rome (335). Repose of St Seraphim of Sarov (1833) – the “winter feast” of St Seraphim. Righteous Juliana of Lazarevsk (1604). (No service)
Saturday 4th January 2025 5.30 p.m. Vespers
Sunday 5th January 2025. Forefeast of Theophany. Sunday Before Theophany. FAST DAY, oil and wine. 10.30 a.m. Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom. Followed by Great Vespers of the Feast and the Great Blessing of Water.
Monday 6th January. FEAST OF THE THEOPHANY (EPIPHANY) OF THE LORD 9.00 a.m. Divine Liturgy of St Basil the Great 6.30 p.m. Vespers for the Feast of the Nativity (by the “Old” Calendar)
Monday 7th January. Рождество Господа нашего Иисуса Христа. Feast of the Nativity (by the “Old” (unrevised) Julian Calendar). 10.30 a.m. Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom.
Sunday 12th January 2025. Afterfeast of Theophany. 10.30 a.m. Divine Liturgy. Followed by Parish Christmastide lunch.
FOOD BANK: As we approach the Christmas Fast, DON’T FORGET THE NEEDS OF OTHERS who do not have enough! Bring contributions please. Let’s try to fill the box twice before Christmas.
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PARISH NEWS
NEWLY DEPARTED: One of our longstanding parish members, Linda (Mary) Jones (nee Pattenden) died lately and her funeral was sung on Friday 13th December. Memory eternal! Please pray also for the newly departed Anna, a young university student who fell sick and very quickly died recently. Her funeral will be sung in January. Вѣчьнаꙗ памѧть, Memory eternal! Please also pray for the newly departed Mary (Daphne Lock), mother of our Parish Community President, Kate. Her funeral will be held in her home Parish of Devon in January. Memory eternal! **BUILDING NEWS UPDATE (DECEMBER)**: The painting of the altar walls has been completed. The scaffolding in the altar area is (still) due to come down imminently. Once that is done a huge clean-up will ensue; and then we can move back to our normal arrangement. Meanwhile, we now have further scaffolding at the back of the church in order to investigate and remedy woodworm activity and water ingress. Initial estimates suggest this too is going to be expensive! Please keep giving generously! THANK YOU for your generous donations. Without this, we would not have a space to worship in. We are extremely blessed to have our own space that does not need to be shared with other users. If we look after it, the building will be sure to last a few more hundred years and serve our community for many generations to come.
GIFT AID |
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Some selected saints (AND FEASTS) of the coming days).. –
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For those who wish to donate to our Parish online, our Facebook fundraiser can be found here: https://www.facebook.com/donate/453504039824339/?fundraiser_source=external_url
Sermon for the Eleventh Sunday of Luke (Sunday of the Forefathers)
Archimandrite Kyril Jenner
Luke 14:16-24
When we read the sayings of our Lord and the stories that he told as parables, it is often difficult to form any impression of what he was actually like as a speaker. The sayings and stories were memorized, passed down, retold, and eventually written down. We mostly read them in translation, which is frequently very formal in style to remind us that we are reading the “Holy Gospel.”
If we look behind the text of the parable of the Great Supper that we read today, we might see a very different picture of our Lord. He was witty and entertaining, and the parable can be seen as something like a piece of stand up comedy.
A wealthy man organized a large dinner party. He invited a lot of friends, who all accepted the invitation. But when he sent a message that all was ready they came up with the most feeble and ludicrous excuses for not actually coming.
The first man has “bought a field” and needs to go and look at it. We might ask what has he being doing all day that prevented him from looking at his field? Did he not look at it before he bought it? Why could he not wait until tomorrow? Why was it so important for him to look at his field at exactly that time when he had previously arranged to attend the dinner party to which he had been invited?
The second man is clearly a farmer. He has bought some new cattle, so he needs to examine them. Did he not examine them before he bought them? Why has he not had time to examine them between buying them and now? Why was it so important to examine them now, rather than go to the dinner party that he had previously agreed to?
The excuse of the third man is even weaker. He has got married between accepting the invitation and the actual time of the dinner party. Did he not know that he was going to get married when he accepted the invitation? He has apparently no plans for any other activity, but just does not go to the dinner party.
The dinner party does seem to have been an all male affair. The host says: “none of those men who were invited will taste my supper.” (Luke 14:24) Perhaps this tells us something about the audience to which our Lord was speaking. He seems on this occasion to be speaking specifically to men, using a story about men. But the teaching given applies to all of us.
We read this text always on the second Sunday before the Feast of the Birth of Christ. We are invited to that Feast. The Church provides us with a rich range of services to celebrate the Feast. Do we accept the invitation to come together to worship God in celebration of his coming into the world? Or are we too wrapped up in the affairs of the world, too much focussed on matters of food and drink and parties, to make the worship of God the centre of our celebration?
At the end of the Gospel reading, the liturgical text adds a verse from Saint Matthew’s Gospel: “Many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14) If we look at the parable, we see that we are the ones who actually make the choice. The call is there, the invitation is there: we are the ones who choose whether or not to accept.
And what is it to which we are ultimately invited? Saint Cyril of Alexandria tells us that it is this “ ‘Come, for all things are ready!’ For God the Father has, in Christ, prepared for the inhabitants of the earth those gifts that are bestowed on the world through him, even the forgiveness of sins, the washing away of all defilement, the communion of the Holy Spirit, the glorious adoption as children, and the kingdom of heaven.” (Sermon 104 on Luke)
What hinders us from accepting this invitation? What excuses can we make for not accepting the forgiveness of our sins? All that we need to do is repent. After we have been baptized, and our defilement washed away, what hinders us from receiving the communion of the Holy Spirit? At every Divine Liturgy we are invited “With fear of God, with faith and love draw near.” Why do we hold back? If we feel that we are unworthy, yes, we are all unworthy. But God makes us worthy.
Perhaps we feel that we have not made sufficient preparation. We have to choose whether or not to prepare for Holy Communion. Do we keep the prescribed fast? Do we pray? That is all that we can do. We can never be fully prepared. As Saint John Chrysostom tells us in his Paschal Homily: “[God] accepts the work done; he welcomes the intention, He honours the achievement; he praises the purpose.”
It is our choice as to whether we do something, so that God may come to meet us, or whether we do nothing and turn away from God. Let us pray that each day we may turn to God. That each day we may repent of our sins and accept God’s forgiveness. That each day we may acknowledge the work done by our Lord and God and Saviour Jesus Christ, and so through his love and compassion we may be taken up into his kingdom.
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Like all small communities we rely on the generosity of friends and well-wishers. If you would like to contribute to the continuation of our parish and the upkeep of our historic church building, you can make a donation here:
https://www.facebook.com/donate/679204386685133/?fundraiser_source=external_url
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